The skies may look clear from our perspective, but just out of view, there’s a junkyard in our low Earth orbit (LEO), a region of space relatively close to our planet’s surface. There are approximately 60,363 tracked objects in orbit, the vast majority of which is space debris. That number doesn’t even include the over one hundred million bits and bobs too small to be tracked. Some speculate that there are over 8,000 metric tons of debris floating around, including non-functional satellites, discarded rocket parts, and broken pieces of spacecraft.
The working satellites in our LEO are vital to our global infrastructure, and with debris moving through space at almost seven times the speed of a bullet, even the smallest impact can create a huge problem. This is an issue we all have a stake in—here’s how the U.S. Space Force is working to tackle it.
Space may seem nearly endless, but our orbit is finite. With no international laws in place to clean up debris, the responsibility must be shared. The U.S. Space Force is doing their part by stepping up and working to keep our planet safe.
